The On Factor
by Allaine
Summary: When Drakken’s plan goes awry, causing Kim and Shego to switch powers, it’s a good thing only Shego had powers . . . right? Post-Graduation, no Kigo.
1. Chapter 1

Title: The On Factor

Author: Allaine

Email:

Disclaimers: All characters belong to Disney, Bob, Mark, Bill, Ed . . . wait, how did those last two guys get in there?

Spoilers: Takes place after the series finale.

Rating: PG-13

Summary: When Drakken's plan goes awry, causing Kim and Shego to switch powers, it's a good thing Kim didn't have any powers . . . did she?

_______________________________

Note: This will be my one KP story for 2009. I've been working almost exclusively in a different fandom (maybe one of you has been following _Reap What You Sow_) for several months now, and I could use the break. And I have to say, really missing Shego these days. Is it strange that I watch the new Madagascar show and wish Marlene the otter was more snarky?

That being said, this is a low-priority story for me, as my other story is nearing a conclusion and it's extremely important to me that I finish this labor of love. Therefore, don't expect this story to be updated more than "infrequently".

Also, this is not a part of the "Unacceptable Sitch" series, which remains in retirement. It takes place no more than six months after "Graduation", as you will see very quickly. It will also be K/R. not Kigo. I can't wrap my brain around how to hook these ladies up so soon after Graduation without completely violating your sense of credibility. I'm not particularly inspired by the K/R relationship, but there are just some things you just have to deal with.

________________________________________________

Chapter One

"Ah, Kim Possible! Won't you both come in?"

Kim felt the weirdness of the situation move up another notch. She couldn't remember the last time Dr. Drakken had greeted her arrival with anything less than complete astonishment. Then again, he _had_ invited her and Ron, so if he'd been surprised when he opened the door, Kim would have suspected he was suffering from early-stage Alzheimer's. "Wouldn't a phone call have been simpler?" she asked dubiously.

"I highly doubt that the situation calls for something so informal," Drakken replied. "I felt it would be best if I had a face-to-face chat with you and Ronald."

Ron gaped at him. "KP, he remembered my name. My first name! Not even Shego uses my first name."

"In case you haven't noticed, Shego never calls someone by their given name if she can help it," Drakken told him. "She's worse than that character on _Lost_, the one all the girls think is fo-shizzle."

Drakken's ferociously misguided use of teen slang finally helped ground this day in reality. He was starting to sound - well, normal. For him. Then she gasped. "Your petals are gone!"

Drakken grunted. "No, just out of sight. I've begun using industrial-strength starch on my collars. There's simply no room for them to slip through." He stepped back. "I believe I invited you in?"

Kim and Ron looked at each other. Drakken and Shego had stayed straight ever since he won the Nobel Peace Prize for his role in stopping the Lorwardian invasion. He'd bought this expensive house, not hidden at all from surveillance or even the naked eye. And he'd recently gone on a short lecture circuit of college campuses. Middleton U had been one of them. Sitting in the audience had been a surreal experience for Kim.

Just not as surreal as this.

"All right, Dr. Drakken," Kim finally said. "But if this is a trick - "

"Pshaw, Kimberly," Drakken interrupted. "I don't think that would be very wise on my part. Which is why I asked you both to be here." He turned and began walking down what appeared to be a main corridor, and Kim and Ron warily followed.

"Where's Shego?" Ron asked.

"Sunbathing by the pool, last I checked," Drakken said. "It's her favorite daily activity."

"So the two of you are living together?"

Drakken turned and looked confused. "Of course," he said. "We've always lived together. Not much point to having a sidekick/bodyguard if she's across town at her apartment."

"No," Kim said. "What Ron meant was, are you two living_ together_? As _one_?"

"You mean - " Drakken said as they entered an exquisitely decorated living room. A look of utter horror crossed his face. "Where did you get that idea?!"

"Um, you don't exactly need a sidekick any more, Drakken," Kim pointed out. "Not as a law-abiding private citizen. But you're still living in the same house."

"And that little hug at the Nobel ceremony - " Ron added.

"That little hug was a product of an impulse - an impulse by my tendrils!" Drakken said hurriedly, his eyes darting to his right. "I had nothing to do with it!"

"Denial - it's not just a river on the planet you helped save," Kim teased.

"Don't joke around like that!" Drakken hissed. "Our 'relationship' was tabloid fodder for days! And guess who Shego took her anger out on? Thank you, but check your insinuations at the door when Shego is near!"

"Fine, sorry," Kim said. "So what's the sitch? Why are we here?"

Drakken straightened his blue lab coat - why was he still wearing that thing? - and sat down. "I think we need to discuss our changing relationship, Kimberly."

"I'm not sure 'relationship' is the word I'd use, Drakken," Kim said.

"Whatever. Let's face facts - I've been forced to retire from the villainy business," he replied, "for two different but equally compelling reasons. First, my evil reputation is shot, of course."

"Frugal Lucre sure seemed impressed in Stockholm, at least."

"And _second_," Drakken said, ignoring Kim's remark, "it's clearly become too dangerous for myself and Shego to fight you any longer. It was different before, but now - "

"Whoa, whoa, wait," Kim interrupted. "What do you mean it's too _dangerous_?"

"Isn't it obvious? It became quite obvious to me that the gloves were off the moment Ronald here killed the Lorwardians."

Kim's head snapped around to look at Ron, whose face had turned pale. He collapsed onto his seat. "It was an accident, Drakken!" A horrible, terrible accident that they'd been able to ignore until GJ undersea divers located the wreckage of the alien vessel and the bodies of the two would-be conquerors. No one was inclined to press charges against Ron - it was practically a state of war, and the Lorwardians were enemy combatants. Plus there wasn't actually any kind of _law_ stating it was illegal to kill nonhuman lifeforms from another planet. Ron hadn't cared. He'd taken the lives of two sentient beings from a race that had built an advanced civilization. Could there be any doubt that their deaths were morally equivalent to the deaths of humans?

Of course there was no blame coming from Kim. He'd engaged the Lorwardians to save her. And Kim knew all about reckless acts of endangerment. Just because Shego had survived without even a hospital stay, it didn't take away from the fact that Kim had kicked her off a building, then electrocuted her. If it had been, say, Monkey Fist, then Ron would have become the sole (human) claimant to the Mystical Monkey powers.

So she could empathize with Ron. With her help and several sessions with Rabbi Katz, Ron was moving on. That didn't make Drakken's remark any easier to take, though.

It didn't help matters when Drakken tapped his chin with one finger. "He accidentally threw them into a spaceship?"

"Drakken, _drop it_," Kim growled. Ron wasn't even defending himself, which bothered her. Maybe it was because Drakken was so blithely assuming Ron was a murderer, when everyone else assured him it had been self-defense, or an accident, or a wartime casualty, or . . .

"All right," Drakken said nervously, "but however you look at it, you can't deny that Ronald's power surge against the Lorwardians meant he had picked up his game - oh, about a hundred times better? You were trouble enough, Kimberly, but when your sidekick is _lifting giant war machines with his mind_, you're almost harmless by comparison."

"Well, I wouldn't say that," Kim grumbled, even as a corner of her mind acknowledged that yes, Ron had powers on a scale that Kim could never approach now.

Drakken chuckled. "In fact, Kimberly, you could say we have something in common. Both of us have sidekicks who could destroy us if they chose to."

"I would never hurt KP," Ron said quietly. "And Kim has taken down much more dangerous people than me."

"Be that as it may, I'm forced to admit – privately! - that Shego was having a hard enough time coping with your Battle Suit, Kimberly. There's no way we can go on waging this fight as long as Ronald has those powers. Considering you've been my archnemesis for years, Kimberly, I thought you'd like to hear it from me personally. I'm hanging up my evil spurs and moving to Corporate America." He shrugged. "It's a different kind of evil, but it's not really the same."

Kim didn't know what to say. Her life had become a little easier once Drakken dropped off the radar, and now it was going to stay that way forever. She should be pleased. She _was_ pleased. It was just that the way of finding out was so odd.

There was a quiet ding somewhere in the rear of the house. "Whoopsie," Drakken said, standing up. "I need to check my marshmallow squares. Would you care to wait by the pool for a few minutes? Shego may have different plans for the future than I do."

"Fine," Kim said, although it always set her teeth on edge to see Shego relaxing in luxurious environments and not deserving it in the slightest. "Which way?"

He pointed to his left. "Down that hall, make a right." Then he hurried away.

"Come on, Ron," Kim said. "Hopefully Shego will be her usual bitchy self. I could use an extra dose of reality."

________________________________________

Dr. Drakken scurried down his basement steps, opened the secret door, and went into his hidden lab. From here, he could see everything, including the pool area where Team Possible was going. Shego was doing laps, as if she didn't have a care in the world.

As far as she knew, she didn't. Drakken hadn't let her in on his little plan, since generally Shego wouldn't permit him to shoot her with a giant ray gun. Once this worked, though, he figured she'd forget about being angry. (Although she'd probably hurt him just a little first.)

The ding Drakken had heard was not in fact marshmallow squares. It was a warning that his new ray was fully charged and operational. After watching too many episodes of the World Series of Poker, he'd christened his invention by naming it the "Suck-Out". It was an appropriate name.

Drakken hadn't lied out there, not really. He couldn't beat Kim Possible if Stoppable was emitting blue light in every direction and throwing banks of machinery with one hand.

So he'd just have to take those powers away from the sidekick.

And, since they had to go somewhere, Shego would be their recipient. All he needed was a clear shot that would hit Stoppable, pass through him, and then hit Shego. Once that happened, Stoppable would go back to being the buffoon, and Shego wouldn't have a problem with Kim Possible's force fields and plasma scoops any longer.

Knowing nobody could possibly hear him, he let loose with a full-throated cackle.

His petals finally popped out.

"Stupid experiment gone wrong," Drakken muttered, even though he still hadn't learned that his words could be applied to all of his experiments.

Shortly to include this one.

_________________________________________

Kim had once observed (ironically, just before her first encounter with Warmonga) that her life had better perks than Shego's, namely "cuter boyfriends". She believed that more than ever, but that didn't mean she couldn't agree with Ron's complaint that Shego, for a woman with a criminal record a mile long, could enjoy some things that she'd probably never have. The money, the long vacations, the expensive resorts. And as Shego emerged from Drakken's pool in a skintight green one-piece swimsuit, Kim enviously noted that she still had the better body.

Fortunately Ron only had eyes for her. He wouldn't have cared if it was Gisele Bundchen getting out. Naked.

"Pumpkin," Shego muttered, grabbing a towel. "Ron."

Kim gasped. Drakken and Shego _never_ called him by his real name, and now suddenly both did it in the same day? Was Ron's moon in Pluto or something?

"Shego," Ron said. "You're looking tanned."

She snorted. "Sarcasm noted," she replied. Shego sunbathed for the warmth. She could still get sunburns, but her pigmentation would never, ever change. "You two are out of uniform. Did Dr. D invite you?"

"You didn't know?" Kim asked.

"He lets me know when he leaves the building," Shego said, shrugging. "Beyond that, he could throw a kegger for the Phi Chi Psi sorority sisters and I wouldn't know about it. What did he want?"

"He wanted to tell us you guys are retiring from villainy," Ron told her.

"_We_ are? Maybe Dr. D is, but I'm not. If he retires, my contract expires and I'm a freelancer, Ron."

"What's with the 'Ron', Shego?" Kim asked. "I noticed I'm still a Pumpkin."

Shego chuckled. "More like an eggplant, Princess. Wide at the bottom, skinny at the top."

Kim glared at her.

"Ron doesn't get cutesy nicknames from me because he's all grown up now," Shego explained. "Big man, taking it to the next level, Ron." She grinned at Kim. "Whereas you're still just the cheerleader. Ron's the adult here, not you."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Ron asked.

"I don't like you, Ron, never will," she said. "But I have to respect you. You've got _cojones_."

Ron looked down doubtfully at himself. "Are those near the pectoral muscles or something?"

"Ignore her, Ron," Kim said before Shego could reply. She'd had a sudden, dreadful insight that Shego was going to say it was because Ron had taken a life, and he didn't need to hear that for the second time today.

She frowned. Was that a coincidence, or had Drakken and Shego rehearsed these conversations in advance?

Shego just shrugged. "You've got some amazing powers, Stoppable. I think I'm going to enjoy taking on your 'monkey style' in the future. It'll be a much better challenge than Cupcake here." Her grin turned positively wicked. "I guess Kim will have to settle for finding the self-destruct button from now on."

Dropping the towel, Shego headed back towards the pool.

_________________________

_There it is!_ _The shot I've been waiting for, _Drakken crowed mentally. He slammed the button as Shego unwittingly put Ron between herself and the Suck-Out.

_________________________

A medium-width nozzle, hidden in the shadows of an attic window, suddenly came to life, blasting a yellow beam downwards right towards Ron.

Or rather, the space Ron had just been occupied. Ron had pursued Shego. She had no right to mock KP like that, and since they weren't battling one another, he had the luxury of telling her so.

But his foot struck a loose stone, and he tripped forward. All the Monkey Magic in the world couldn't save him from falling down and hitting his head on something.

And as he fell, the beam shot over him. Once again, a pratfall had saved him from something worse.

Unfortunately, Kim had moved to try to catch him before he hit bottom, and the beam struck her instead. And it didn't go _through _her. It went _into_ her, threw her forcibly back into Shego, and the two were bathed in yellow light as they fell into the pool.

Horrified, Ron stumbled to his feet. He couldn't see either woman, as multicolored flashing lights in the water made it hard to see. He almost expected a hundred gremlins to come flooding out.

When the light subsided, Ron rubbed his eyes and looked down - right into Shego's _pissed_ eyes. "Yeargh!" he screamed, throwing himself back.

Shego climbed awkwardly out of the pool, looking unhappy but unharmed, and Ron was relieved to see Kim getting out a couple yards away in similar condition. Of course, she wasn't wearing a swimsuit, so being soaking wet had a different, much less flattering look for her.

"Excuse me, Stoppable," Shego said. "I think I need to go and eviscerate my employer now."

"Not so fast, Shego," Kim said as she stood on dry ground unsteadily. "Why should I believe you weren't part of this?"

"Uh, because I don't like being _shot_? Doy!"

"Yeah, but even so, I want Drakken first," Kim retorted. "So whether you want to kill him or protect him, I need you to step aside."

"Bite me, Pumpkin," Shego said. "I got dibs on the talkative member of Blue Man Group."

"Ladies, can't we work together on this?" Ron asked.

"_No!_" both women said in unison.

Mystical Monkey Power or not, Ron was going to do what he did best - not getting caught between these two.

"I see last year's clothes are looking a little wet, Kimmie," Shego sneered, cocking a fist back. "How about I dry those off for you?"

Kim was already dodging the expected plasma burst as Shego threw her arm forward. And Shego didn't exactly watch her hand as it moved. So Ron was the first to notice.

"Uh, Shego, don't you usually turn your powers on first?"

Shego looked down, startled. She shook her hand, opened and closed it, made a fist, and then did the same with the other. "Oh, Drakken," she breathed. "If that ray did what I think it did . . . "

It was about that time that Kim realized her hands were on fire.

She screamed and ran for the pool, plunging both hands under the water. The water hissed and boiled, but she could still see the flames _under_ the water.

" . . . you're a dead man."

To be continued . . .


	2. Chapter 2

Title: The On Factor (2/??)

Author: Allaine

Email:

Disclaimers: All characters belong to Disney, Bob, Mark, Bill, Ed . . . wait, how did those last two guys get in there?

Spoilers: Takes place after the series finale.

Rating: PG-13

Summary: When Drakken's plan goes awry, causing Kim and Shego to switch powers, it's a good thing Kim didn't have any powers . . . did she?

* * *

Chapter Two

"Now my life is a full freaking oyster," Shego muttered as she turned away from the pool a second time. Great. Her employer, the peace prize winner, the man who signed her checks . . . was going to die. She didn't mean that figuratively. She was literally going to choke him until he turned whatever color it was blue people turned into. Stoppable seemed to be getting over murder just fine. Like she couldn't do better than him?

She grabbed the back patio door and pulled it open. It only made it halfway, however, before it was yanked from her hand. The door slammed shut so hard that the glass shattered.

"If you're trying to stop me from going inside," she said, looking at the arm that had materialized to her right and the hand against the door frame, "you're not doing very well – Stoppable."

"Fix – her," Ron said angrily as Shego turned to face him. Blue as a raspberry – not that she'd ever actually _seen_ a blue raspberry – and hair standing on end. "She doesn't know how to make it stop."

"Neither did I," Shego replied, indifferent. "I had to figure that crap out when the comet hit. Took me days. Why should Miss Priss have it any easier? She can do anything? Fine. She can think about it."

Ron grabbed her by the shoulder and threw her. It wasn't a very good grip, but it didn't matter. She had no time to prepare herself for it. If he'd thrown her any harder, she would have cleared the pool and probably broken something. As it was, she just hit the water again, but this time with enough force to make her vision briefly fade to black. She surfaced, coughing up water.

Ron just looked at the hand he had used.

"See?!" Shego snarled as she staggered toward the pool steps. "This is what I'm talking about! I had it bad enough before today, but now the _sidekick_ is Superman! I suppose I should be grateful you didn't throw me farther, Stoppable. I saw how far you threw – "

"Don't," Ron said. "Just – don't say their names."

Shego got out of the water and came towards him. "Out of my way, Ron," she told him. "Drakken is probably sucking his thumb under his desk somewhere inside. I'll have no problem choking the life from him. I would _prefer_ to just set his 'little genius' on fire, but then that's getting back to why I'm pissed in the first place!"

Ron stared at her. "You can't mean that," he said.

"Have I ever struck you as someone with a tight rein on their temper, Ron?"

"You don't want to kill him, Shego. Because if you do," he said, "you'll question yourself for the rest of your life."

Shego studied his expression for a moment. Typically, when she built up a huge head of steam, it took hours for her to calm down. Surprisingly, though, she felt her anger subside – a bit. "Wow," she told him. "You're really in love with Princess, aren't you?"

He blinked, surprised. "Well, yeah, duh."

"And because you love her so much, sometimes you use those new powers of yours to do bad, bad things. I always knew love was a bad idea."

Ron looked back at Kim, who had taken her hands out of the water and was now looking around helplessly, no idea what to do with her flaming hands. "It's not a bad idea," he said. "If I didn't love her so that I didn't care this much about what she thought of me . . . "

He turned back to his normal color. "Then I might just grab onto this power and never let it go. Not until people like you were all gone."

Shego folded her arms. She supposed she should be frightened by how much he meant that. He'd kill her just to protect Kim from her. But – huh, he was even stronger than she'd thought.

"Please, Shego," Ron said. "I'm dealing with these powers every day. Don't make her do the same thing."

She sighed. "Two minutes. You give me two minutes' headstart while I look for Dr. Don't. And I'll fix your girlfriend."

Ron took a step back.

Shego grunted. "All right, Pumpkin, it's time for a lesson from your Auntie Shego," she said loudly.

Kim glared at her. See, love was bad, but this was why anger could be a good idea. Anger made helplessness go away. "I don't want help from you, Shego."

"Deal with it. I struck a bargain with your sugar daddy. You want to know how to turn those off or not?"

The plasma was practically dripping from her hands. Kim's shoulders slumped. "Yes, please," she mumbled. "I, I knew how to turn Hego's powers on and off, but – "

"Hego is an idiot. If his powers were complicated, he would have leveled Go City years ago. Now, it took me days to learn this when I was younger than you," Shego said. "My – _your_ – Go Glow is powered by strong, negative emotions. After I woke up from the comet strike, I spent days in a rage. I didn't look like other people any more, and I set fire to anything I touched."

Shego didn't like doing this. She didn't like thinking about that time. In a way, she'd been angry ever since.

"Go to your happy place, Kimmie. Think of something nice. You and Stoppable on the beach. Jumping out of a plane. A midget on a tricycle, I don't care. Happy equals no plasma. Then just think of something that pisses you off when you want to turn it back on. For me, it's your face – usually right after it's popped out of the ventilation."

"That's it?"

"Do you want it to be harder? Fling it around for a couple days and it'll extinguish itself - for a while. You want to do it that way?"

Kim grumbled and turned around. "Can't do this looking at _you_."

"And here I thought you'd secretly wanted me for years," Shego said dryly.

Wow. Girl graduates from high school and already she's learned how to give someone the (flaming) finger.

Shego watched as the glow around Kim's hands gradually receded. She supposed she could be a _little_ sympathetic. That first week of figuring out her powers had been hell. A year ago she might have wished it on Kim. Now, eh, it wasn't like they'd crossed paths lately.

Kim turned back. "Ron, they're gone!" she said, relieved.

"Yeah, they're gone," he replied.

Shego turned away and walked past him. "But they're still in there," she murmured. "Aren't they, Stoppable?"

"Ron, why are you letting her go? She could – "

She didn't hear the sidekick's response. If Ron was the sidekick any more. Maybe he wasn't – until Kim got the green glow. Now who the hell knew?

Drakken might know. She'd ask him. But he'd have to write it down, because he wouldn't be able to breathe.

* * *

"This could be good, right?" Kim asked anxiously as they went into Drakken's house (until the authorities seized it, anyway) two minutes later. "I mean, Shego doesn't have powers any more, so she can't hurt people any more!"

"Yeah, maybe," Ron said.

"I hope I'm not going to burn something down every time I get angry," Kim added, becoming more subdued.

"Guess I'll have to be extra good at taking out the trash," he told her.

Kim's eyes widened. "You mean, when we're – living together one day?"

Ron blinked. He hadn't been thinking about it that way when he said it, but yeah, wasn't it obvious that they'd be living together some day? And then . . .

Whoa. Too soon to think about marriage, Ron.

"When we're living together," he just assured her.

She finally smiled. "Happy place," she said.

When Ron found Drakken – well, hopefully there would be something left once Shego was through with him.

* * *

"It was for your own good!" Drakken squealed.

Shego didn't say anything. She just backhanded him across the face.

"Remember the good old days?" she asked him. "You'd do something to really piss me off, and I'd chase you around that big ol' lair flinging plasma at you? Well, I don't seem to _have_ plasma any more, so if I want to hurt you, I'm going to need to do it with my bare hands."

He scrabbled at the wall with his hands, struggling to his knees. She kicked him in the ribs, and he went back down.

"And feet," Shego added unnecessarily. "But you know what else I don't have? A big ol' lair, that's what. Which means you've got nowhere to run, Dr. D, except through me. And we both know that'll never happen."

"Shego, please, this wasn't supposed to happen!" he shrieked. "I was aiming for Stoppable! It was supposed to give _his_ powers to you!"

Shego raised an eyebrow. "So you could have a blue girl of your own?"

"The tendrils hugged you at the awards ceremony, not me!!" The petals burst out of his collar once more.

With them, however, came familiar roots and vines. They hesitated, then launched in her direction.

_Oh yeah_, she thought. _Something else different from the good old days_.

Shego didn't bother struggling as plant tendrils wrapped tightly around her, pinioning her arms against her sides. "Let me go, Dr. D," she said coldly.

"You'll kill me if I do!"

"I'll kill you when I escape after you don't!"

"Nobody is going to die today."

Shego sighed. This was why she didn't like people. They kept showing up. "Kimmie," she said. "Care to give me two minutes more? Drakken here is being a little wuss about this."

"Give it up, Drakken," Kim said to him, ignoring her. "What was that beam? What happened out there?"

_She sounds like Hego sometimes. And I had such hopes for her in the banter department._

"You think you're all that, Kim Possible – "

Ron stepped around Kim, brushed past Shego, and extended a single finger in the direction of Drakken's nose. There was a small crackle of something like blue static electricity and Drakken started.

"The Suck-Out, it's the Suck-Out!" Drakken gibbered. "Just don't let him throw me into the ionosphere, Kim Possible!""

"The good cop, bad cop routine, Kimmie?" Shego asked sarcastically.

"There's no good cop here right now, Shego," Kim snapped. "More like bad cop, worse cop." She turned back to Drakken. "I don't get it, Drakken. You were aiming at Ron when you hit me, but I'm the one with the powers, not her. So, if I hadn't fallen in the way, Ron would just be twice as powerful."

"Nothing went according to plan," Drakken said, sulking now. "Stoppable fell, you got in the way, the beam pushed you instead of going through you, _and_ you fell in the pool! All that water conducting energy? Anything could have happened in that chlorinated cauldron!"

"Don't you get it, Pumpkin? It backfired. Don't try to complicate it with things like logic," Shego grumbled. "He screwed up. Things went backwards. This happens."

Kim's hands went from pale to green in an instant. She swept a hand past the tendrils keeping Shego in place, and they were burned to ash. The unburned remains shrank away, writhing. "But if you shot us again, it could – theoretically – be reversed?"

"Obviously, yes," Drakken said.

Kim sighed. Suddenly she whirled and pushed both hands in the direction of the machine that had powered the ray gun in the attic. Green fire splashed out and hit the machine, wrecking it almost instantly.

"What the _fu-_ "

"Now, now, Shego," Kim said. "That language in front of teenager?"

"You just destroyed the only thing that could get my glow out of your body!"

"No," Kim replied with exaggerated patience. "I just destroyed the only thing that could put your glow back into _your_ body."

Shego gaped at her. She should have been furious, but the feeling she identified was an intense dismay. "You thieving little bitch!"

Kim shrugged. "I'm sorry, Shego, but did you really think I'd let you have your plasma back? You admitted it yourself out there. If Drakken was staying retired, then you'd start freelancing yourself out there." She smiled evilly. "How much are people going to pay for you now?"

Shego slapped her.

Ron grabbed her wrist and twisted it behind her back. "Knock it off, Shego," he said quietly.

Kim was the one who looked shocked now. "You _slapped_ me? When did you turn into such a _girl_?"

"I don't know, maybe when you _stole my powers_?" Shego shook her free fist impotently in Kim's direction. "Screw this. I'm leaving. I haven't committed a crime today, other than assaulting that blue nimrod, and you can't hold me here."

"Let her go, Ron," Kim said calmly, rubbing her cheek with a now-depowered hand. "She's right. And besides, it's not like she's a threat any more."

Ron let go of Shego's arm, but she barely even noticed as she backed away. Kim was _dismissing her_? The pain of being kicked into an electrical tower was less than the humiliation of being deemed _irrelevant_.

"Trust me, Kimmie," she said. "You're going to want to know where I am later, but you won't know how to find me – until it's too late."

Shego glanced at Ron. "Enjoy Kimmie with powers," she sneered. "I'm sure she'll handle it _just_ as easily as _you_ have."

Then she stormed back out the way she came. She didn't even spare Drakken another look. Shego would like to see him break out of prison _now_.

* * *

"You appear to be unharmed, Kimmie," Anne said as she finished her examination. "Your hands haven't sustained any burns, which is amazing – "

"It's the Glow, Mom," Kim said. She concentrated for a moment, and her powers sprang to life. "I'm just as safe as Shego was."

"Hm," Anne said. "I'm sorry you couldn't get her here. Doctors know very little about how the human body survives the Go-Glow. We know nothing at all about how the human body survives losing it long-term."

Kim looked doubtful. "You mean there could be health risks?"

"There could be," Anne said. "Emphasis on _could_. Like I said, no one knows."

"Huh. She said I'd want to know where she was some day," Kim said. "Didn't think it might be today."

"We have people looking for her."

Kim glanced over to the corner of the room, where Doctor Director had been silently monitoring the medical exam. "I guess this is a good day for you," she said. "Drakken back in prison, Shego without powers, me _with_ powers. Good Guys 3, Bad Guys 0."

"Mm-hm," Betty Director murmured. "I'm just glad you're unharmed by this."

"Well, we know Shego's brothers are still okay, and they've had their powers for years," Kim said. "And Shego certainly never seemed to be suffering physically. So I should be fine."

"Besides the skin discoloration," Betty reminded her.

Having a green Go-Glow had nothing to do with the sudden paleness of Kim's face. And Anne glared at Betty, who seemed to lose her composure for once.

"I'm sorry, I didn't realize you hadn't talked about that yet," Betty apologized. "I just thought – "

"I used to have Hego's powers," Kim said. "And I was fine. This won't be any different."

Hopefully Kim didn't notice the look Betty shared with Anne. _You only had his powers for a short time, Kim. Unless we find a way to transfer these to a third party, we can't assume anything._

Which reminded her . . .

"Kim," Betty said. "According to Drakken's confession, his 'Suck-Out' was designed to transfer Ron Stoppable's powers to Shego. Basically, it would steal them from the first target, and insert them into the second target."

"That's what he told us, yes," Kim agreed.

"But in your case, the powers were stolen from the _second_ and received by the first. How was that even possible?"

"Well, the beam pushed me into Shego, so in a way, I was still being struck by the ray when it then struck Shego," Kim explained. "And then we went into the pool."

"I see," Betty said. "What was the angle of the shot? Would it have fired across the pool or into it?"

"Into it," Kim assured her. "It was fired from above us."

"Mm. So it's safe to say that the ray continued to strike the water even after you were in the pool."

Kim nodded.

"Dr. Director, what are you getting at?" Anne asked.

Betty looked at Kim's mother. No need to worry them unnecessarily. "Nothing, Dr. Possible," she told them. "I'm just trying to understand how Dr. Drakken's plan worked in reverse. If they were both in the water after being shot, AND the energy from the ray was being fired into the water at the same time, then anything could have happened in that pool. I think it's quite possible," she added, "that instead of transferring a single target's powers, the Suck-Out switched the powers of two targets."

"So Shego's powers were swapped with mine?"

"It would explain a few things."

"But I don't have powers," Kim pointed out.

Betty smiled. "Shego's loss, not yours."

Kim chuckled, then yawned.

"Dr. Director, I understand you have a case to resolve," Anne told her, "but she's tired, and I know a certain boyfriend of hers wants to say good-night?"

"Say no more," Betty said. "I'll let you know if we locate Shego. We'll run our tests, don't worry."

Kim waved tiredly instead of saying anything, and Betty went out into the hospital hallway. As she walked out, though, she held her wrist up to her mouth.

"I'm going to need to see all the scientists who worked on the On Factor project," Betty said into the transceiver. "Keep trying to find Shego, and in the meantime, I want to step up surveillance on Kim Possible. More than ever, we need to know if today was a very good day, or a first-class disaster for the good guys."

Betty looked back at Kim's hospital room. She had a world's worth of hopes for the teenager. For that reason, Kim absolutely had to be kept away from Shego until this whole thing was settled.

It would be a major calamity, after all, if Shego killed her.

To be continued . . .


End file.
